Of Decadance & Unity
by Jakyll
Summary: While Shepard is off saving the Galaxy for the first time, a Cerberus project goes awry and leaves those who it was to be tested on full of questions and more than capable of finding answers. Takes place over ME 1 & 2, First Fic. Updates unknown.
1. Prologue: Decadance

**Prologue**

"How does he do it?" For the fifth time today, The Illusive Man has pondered this.

He watched as reports on the condition of Eden Prime flooded in, finding himself pondering how he was getting any reports at all. Not only did this mean that his source was still alive, but the colony itself had to still be intact. Those damn geth were the last thing The Illusive Man expected to have attacked, well anything really. The real question here was not who was still alive, but more of who was keeping the others alive. He knew those farmers couldn't last a second in a real firefight, let alone in a fight with synthetics.

One of the dossiers in his hands recovered from Alliance archives revolving around the Eden Prime incident stood out the most, an interesting subject to say the least. He had survived the raid on Mindoir when he was young, unsurprisingly enough he joined the Alliance after this to strike back at those that had taken all he knew away from him. Mindoir was a nightmare for all of humanity, quite surprising that he did not end up dead or enslaved.

Of course this was an assumption, maybe he signed up for the cash? Who knows? There is another standout achievement in this dossier, seems he was the one who survived one of the Project Undermine test sites. _Never did like thresher maws._ The Illusive Man thought to himself as he read the after action report on that particular project. _They're brutally efficient at what they do though._ Fifty dead, and that was only counting the Alliance unit.

'Now it appears that the Survivor of Akuze is also the hero of Eden Prime' he mused. Humanity is working its way up the ranks, and this man, this Shepard, was leading the charge. 'He'd be a damn good asset to Cerberus.' The Illusive Man put away the dossiers and pulled up a holo regarding a new project that was in the works, Project Unity.

The concept was simple, put together a mixed racial crew and see how much more efficiently they can work together compared with a standard human crew. In all honesty, the given chance of results showing up with a pay-off were slim, at least we don't have too invest an excessive amount of credits into this.

A soft _beep_ emitted from his private terminal, knowing that all information sent directly to him was important, or it damned well better be. He opened the message.

The Illusive Man's eyebrows shot up, "Spectre? Really?" The report received from one of the Unity cell members for candidates that Commander Shepard had _just _been accepted into the elite of the council.

"This complicates things." The Illusive Man announced to himself. Project Unity can't reroute Shepard through Alliance channels to pick up the the test subjects. He doesn't have answer to anyone anymore now. _Alright, we'll just have to use some alternatives._

The Illusive Man contacted the project lead, one doctor Jerry Lysander. A tall but thin man who had a nasally accent. "You understand that our best candidate is now out of the picture Dr. Lysander? We can't expect to get this project off the ground without someone capable of getting the job done."

Lysander, who responded through a comm channel, possibly too busy to show his face on holo, sounded almost pleased that Shepard had been taken out of the selection list.

"We don't need Shepard, he carried too much publicity, too much weight on his shoulders also. Shepard is a ticking time bomb judging by his psych reports. We need someone who can command confidence and can hold their own."

"There in lies the problem Lysander, there is no other like him, he was the only marine to survive Akuze, we're not likely to find another like him. That which brands him near unfit for duty also makes him an incredible person."

"It is in quantity sir, that you are wrong" Lysander's voice seemed confident in spite of his very replaceable position. "I noticed a trend in the psychological profiles involving thresher maw attacks, those poor sods that make it out alive are as stoic as a wall. Walls we can use."

The Illusive Man gave thought to this suggestion. "You are suggesting we deliberately attack colonies in hopes of getting another man like Shepard? Do you even realize the amount of lives thrown away, all the-"

"Of course I do!" Lysander cut in, prepared to counteract this speech. "The lives of a few colonists would be meager to the amount saved by such a man."

"The chances of this happening again are mathematically near impossible, Shepard was one of a kind, and the Alliance might start investigating these thresher attacks more closely if they keep occurring on the fringes of space. How did you even know of Project Undermine?"

"Cerberus needs to safeguard its secrets from itself more closely, once your in, you gain access to more information than I thought was necessary. A rat could easily catch wind of other projects whist infiltrating one, we could loose everything if you don't start securing data more closely."

The Illusive Man was now agitated, he didn't appreciate the Doctor nosing around in his information sector, hell Lysander isn't even tech savvy, better start locking down systems for upgrades.

"Security aside, suppose I go along with this plan of yours." The Illusive man continued, "We can't go around planting thresher maws on every fringe colony in the Terminus systems. We can't risk being linked to Akuze, last thing we need is Shepard coming after us himself."

"We need only do this once, after this, I can assure you we will have all the variables needed to ensure we get another Shepard."

_Only once? Too good to be true, its bad enough i'm was about to agree to another massacre._

"Listening."

"Akuze was small, and it produced one man with a great fortitude. What if we did the same thing to a city?"

"Your mad, a city? The loss of life would be too large, too many for the sake of one man."

"Hear me out, we would only have to run it once, the chances of survival are marginally better than a rural colony, and the planetary militia will deal with the thresher maws before casualties are significant. I have not even mentioned the best part. We may end up with more than one person."

Silence filled both ends of the comm. Lysander's strained voice began to give The Illusive Man a headache. He took a swig of the shot he held in his left hand since the start of the conversation.

"I'm listening"

"Good." Lysander had let out a breath he did not realize he was holding. "I have a selection of planets that make for a good ground zero, I believe it is up to you to decide, who am I to judge who lives or dies?"

'_Figures Lysander didn't have it in him to chose who dies._The Illusive Man takes yet another swig of his beverage. _Every person has moral bounds and I still have yet to meet mine._' thought The Illusive Man as he received the list, it was not long, but at a glance, he already knew which of these planets would suffer another seemingly random thresher maw attack.

**A/N: **God I have been working on this concept in my head forever, my first Fan fiction, so please don't stab me repeatedly as I work out the kinks. Constructive criticism appreciated, and grammatical errors will be terminated with extreme prejudice if found. Reviews are greatly appreciated, and ideas will be taken into consideration. Most story influences will be secondary, and this may be the only direct involvement you will see by any of the game.

I don't own Mass Effect, nor the disclosed characters that populate the game.


	2. Chapter One: The Outcast

**Chapter One: The Outcast**

Tylant Arterius was not your average turian, being the son of a Spectre never is, but even more so for poor Tylant. That being said, he held the determination of an Asari Justicar, not as many years of course, but his search for the truth far made up for that. You see, Tylant was the son of one Saren Arterius, which is all fine and dandy until he had discovered the journal entries as to why his father left him.

Tylant thought his father had taken one too many doses of some illegal drug, or perhaps had his head smashed in with biotics one to many times at some point in his life. Maybe he just had seen too much horrific crap for one man to tolerate. Maybe he didn't even even write these journals.

All of these were acceptable excuses to Tylant. He could have accepted any of these as fact knowing his father was anything but a saint. But admitting to your sins is one thing, having seen the dreadnought sized ship of unknown origins parked outside your little hiding hole on Zorya. Maybe its not too hard to believe that your father, a Spectre, known for facing impossible odds, is the one responsible for the attack on Eden Prime.

Tylant didn't know what would happen when he confronted his father, _if_ he could get to his father. The main problem associated with getting to Saren was simply leaving the planet. Much like the majority of Zorya, Tylant had trouble leaving the planet, a shorthand of industrial momentum due to the Blue Suns lack of production facilities. Then again, its pretty hard to build a ship when you have spores floating outside all major population areas.

Too get to Saren, Tylant had to get a ship, to get a ship, Tylant needed forcibly remove the owners and fly out, to fly out, Tylant needed a pilot, and to hire a pilot, Tylant needed credits.

_Fun stuff._ He thought to himself as he approached the bar near the edge of town, a small group of dossiers in his hand. _The Utopia's Canteen, seems straightforward enough._

As Tylant approached the metal door, a male human was thrown out forcibly by three krogan before he reached it. Tylant did a double take at the human, _It took three krogan to get rid of him, either security's lax or that's a tough bastard. Exactly the kind of people I need._ Not that Tylant cared, but it didn't hurt to observe everything.

Tylant stood stock still as the human got up and _tackled _the nearest krogan. Tylant decided that he should get into the bar before blood got on his armor. Human blood tended to stain and _attacking a krogan without a gun and 100 yards between you and him is suicide._

The ruckus outside was actually the norm, well, not the human tackling krogan part, but street fights and shootouts were popular in Morgue, hence the name. It was freelance central, a lack of Blue Sun control in the area spawned a population of freelancers. Problem was, work was hard to get, and those who fight alone usually compete to get a job done.

It was a near city sized town filled with a large number of the standard population, which is all well and good because the Blue Suns pretty much owned the entire planet. It did pay well, but it might as well been a prison. Hardly any ships went down, and hardly any ships went up. Hijacking attempts were met with serious resistance. The only easy ticket was covered in blue armor and confined to a life of front line infantry. Or a body bag, but that was never an option.

Tylant took a seat at the bar and ordered a drink, trying to scope out some of the people on the dossiers

he acquired from an ex-Cerberus operative. You'd think they would increase security from the inside, but nope. Shame he had to go on the run, Tylant could have used his help. But until then, all he had for his last hope were these little name tidbits. This left Tylant with a generous helping of names for experts and experienced professionals that were not on Zorya.

Those that were on Zorya were dwindling fast. There were three people left alive that could help him on this side of the planet, out of the original twenty two who knew how to fly a ship. The first one was a Blue Suns pilot who probably got paid too much to betray his organization. The second being the ex-Cerberus officer, who was last seen in the jungle escaping from undercover agents who traced his leak to Morgue. The final being a Quarian slave who was currently in possession by the local crime boss, probably to fix the only ship that has a right to leave without getting knocked out of the sky by the colony defense cannons.

This was another factor that had to be considered in his long but tenuous to-do-list. Even to break in and take the Quarian would require about the same firepower needed to take a ship. So priority one, get some help. Tylant skimmed the holos of a few dossiers, trying to see if anyone in the bar matched the description. He needed a fighter, but some extra tech skills wouldn't hurt either.

This train of thought was interrupted by a krogan, no not a mild, sit down and order him a drink kind of krogan, but by the 'was just outclassed and thrown across a bar' kind of krogan. He had sailed through the now open door and into the stool to the right of Tylant. Dead or unconscious, but bleeding none the less.

Outside the door stood the human who had suicidally tackled the krogan, his face a twisted baring of teeth and his fists covered in blood. Orange blood. Krogan blood, that stuff doesn't wash out easily either. Wearing some sort of casual shirt and cargo pants, a heavy pistol strapped to his left hip.

Now, the krogan being thrown by the man outside was certainly a spectacle, differentiating from what usually happened in Morgue, but this human had just bested three krogan in hand to hand combat. Tylant glanced at the dossier in his hand, to his surprise, and maybe to his luck, it was a match, and he was pretty high on the list too, which meant a lot because the best were at the top. This man was five below an apparently renown assassin who rested at the top of the list labeled 'Professional Riflemen'. Not that he could tell, he had never heard of Thane Krios, but maybe that's what gave him an edge.

Hired guns are one thing, but Tylant wanted someone who was used to coming out alive in high risk missions, not riddled with bullets as a distraction for others. This man fit the bill perfectly.

"Your not welcome here *breath* Earth-Clan" A volus bartender uttered, " Ill have to *breath* get local security to kill you *breath* if you don't leave."

The human went up to the bar and sat right beside Tylant. He spoke in a crackling tone, like he had a cold.

"All I wanted was a beer."

"*breath* No, you drank twice as much as you had been willing to pay for yesterday. *breath* You already can't pay for more, and your lucky I don't charge *breath* you the salary I paid those guards."

"Is it really going to be that way?"

Tylant chimed in "Relax, ill buy for him. After that display you should be giving this man a keg."

"Giving away *breath* beer for killing my protection isn't very good for business."

"Doesn't have to be, you volus can make money off anything."

The volus just shook his head and went to pour said beer.

The man sat there, a look of sadness swirling into his features, he had obviously tried to drink away his problems, and stopped whatever thoughts were mingling in his mind to turn to the turian who so generously gave him a drink. His face seemed content, but he wasn't all there, he was glancing in the corners of the room with suspicion.

"What's your name?"

Tylant hadn't been expecting him to communicate at all, given his current position he expected the man to down the beer in front of him first. Maybe the dossiers he had put on the bar had piqued his interest, since the top one had his name on it. Have to be careful on what he said next, he wasn't stable from the looks of it.

"Tylant Arterius, and yourself?"

"I think you already know, why don't you just read that dossier acquired from that ex-Cerberus operative that you ran into."

"How did you-"

The human pulled out a very large and intimidating pistol whist the turian was speaking from his left hip and stuck it into Tylant's abdomen.

"Read it"

The turian stopped moving, almost stopped breathing, if he moved he feared the human would shoot him and he would bleed out whist everyone continued on without another care in the world. Life sucks.

"I said read it."

The human had repeated himself, probably because he noticed Tylant's reaction to his gun on him. _Rookie, obviously not trained past military basic, lack of movement, but no shaking either, either the this one is very deceiving or is scared out of his wits, given that he's turian, I'd say he's very good at deceiving body language, I expected him to start stammering the moment I put the gun on him._

Tylant was scared out of his wits, they never thought of teaching how to deal with this in basic. He looked over to the data pad, cursing the angle and slowly went to pick up and read this man's Cerberus history report

"Name: Jakyll'Durant, Age: 19, Sex: Male, H.. Height: Six feet and two inches."

Tylant stopped reading here, and Jakyll nodded to continue his gunpoint dictation of his biography.

"Ha..ir color: brown, Iris co-lor: unknown"

Tylant stopped to look his captor in the eyes, wishing he didn't stall on his words. and also had difficulty discerning what color they were, its almost as if they were a meld of green and blue. He continued reading. He could ask when his life was not in danger.

"Jakyll is a... former N7 infiltrator who joined the Alliance in 2180 and left in 2182, performing exceptionally in the field... After a disagreement with a commanding officer, Jakyll disobeyed standing orders to deal with a group of mercenaries who had captured hostages and demanded ransom, Jakyll single-handedly freed the hostages held on the planet of Anhur and received several fatal injuries at the cost of all the hostages being returned safely. This prevented court-martial and let Jakyll go with honorable discharge."

It was a mouthful, but Tylant had suddenly been intrigued at what the he was reading. He never got a chance to read the bio, as he had been busy cross referencing pilot names with the obituary logs on Zorya before he got to the bar. _If this man is so great, whats he doing on this backwater dump in a bar that made a habit of throwing him or, scratch that, trying to throw him out. Not only that, but he looks fine to me, not a scratch on him. Save that krogan blood... but thats not bodily harm directed towards him._

"Not done yet." Jakyll had broken Tylant out of his pondering stupor, and just as soon started reading again as he felt the gun in his gut again.

"Cerberus had taken interest in Jakyll after his discharge in 2182, and had offered to return him to his former self with minimal consequences. Agreeing upon this, he was a recovery subject as part of Project Regeneration. Upon completion of the project, Jakyll and fourteen others involved in the project were asked to infiltrate a space station over one of Kahje's Moons, known as Second Sun."

Jakyll seemed to break in to the story. "We were all tasked with finding and killing some political figure on the station, it seemed simple enough, while we were there I decided to go ahead get a little physical modification, having your bones enforced with a synthetic weave really helps in the long run. Continue."

Tylant glanced at the odd man, who sounded way too old for his age, interrupting his own stories and putting in what he knew. Tylant decided to interrupt the story for a question.

"Can you please take the gun out of my side, its under my ribcage now and rather uncomfortable."

"You seem to forget that the gun appears to be a gun, would you like for it to stay where it is, or would you rather have it move where it could discharge if the user feels that this meeting is over with."

"Point taken." Tylant continued on, "Within four days, the space station was destroyed entirely, due to unforeseen circumstances. Wait what?"

"Ha, that unforeseen circumstance turned out to be a crazy bitch who slowly took the whole thing down, crashed Second Sun into the moon it was orbiting. It was the break I needed to cut all ties to Cerberus and fast."

Tylant continued reading "To this day, thirteen bodies-"

"Fourteen."

"Have been confirmed dead, Jakyll's body not being recovered, it is presumed that he is still alive, and is a risk to all Cerberus operatives within the system. Did you kill that operative that I met up with?"

"No, I was not after him, I was after you. Someone wants the son of a certain Saren Arterius. Cerberus has an internal bounty on my head for its Terminus entrenched operatives. That warning is for any idiot behind an internal affairs desk that thinks they can take a low risk operation clean up. In case you were wondering."

Jakyll got off of his seat,"Get up, we must go where no prying eyes and attuned ears may obtain something that can't be risked."

"And where might that be? You didn't seem to mind disclosing a lot of personal information in front of a variety of strangers." Tylant got off his seat, still mindful of the gun prodding into his gut.

"Thats for me know and for you to guess at."

"Guess at?"

*Smack*

Tylant hit the floor, hard, he didn't expect the blow to the side of his face in the least bit. Jakyll holstered his gun and threw the young turian over his shoulder, hauling him off to a much more safer location, somewhere that didn't have three Cerberus agents tailing him. _Goddamn Cerberus, when did they get so numerous? _The only trace the turian had been there being a few data pads and two untouched beers._  
_

/

Deya'Torgue nar Koal was not one who gave up easily. Being a slave is hard, but being an essential slave that could affect the future of those who held you captive makes life simple. You could say she was being held against her will, but from any other angle it looked as though she was being bribed into fixing one of the only spaceships this side of the hemisphere. She played along now, if only because she was told any attempts to leave would be met with a gun and a smile.

Reasonable hours, a job she didn't mind doing, and protection from her boss in case any of those mercenaries decided to ogle her. She could almost stay. Almost, it wasn't until she was half way done with replacing the first engine that she had separated from the small boxy frigate that she realized she was useless to them afterwards. Other than the ship, everything else was low management, nothing else needed her expertise, she could try to pilot too, maybe that would win some hearts, but skimming through a half burnt Alliance manual on how to drive a VTOL couldn't quell her fears that she would crash and burn, literally. _Maybe that wasn't a bad way to go, its better than whats bound to happen once I'm done here._

_Maybe some dashing hero would come in guns blazing to save me, or perhaps the sky can fall too while I'm at it. _Deya started to sabotage the engines in a fit of frustration, crossing wires that really shouldn't be crossed. The way this was set up, with poor welds and an engine thats output far outmatched what it could handle, her work was almost done already, taking numerous shortcuts, her work certainly looked good to the untrained eye. If there was anyone who had at least looked at a brand new Batarian Ros'vla class cargo ship would know that there was something off about the thrusters. This thing would be lucky to take off in one piece. She snickered at the thought off the engines snapping off mid-flight and continually climbing into the sky whist the rest of the ship fell towards the appropriately named town. Her work was complete, her judgment came tomorrow.

/

"Wake up"

_ Ow my head, ow my head, ow my head. _Tylant very-_very_ slowly opened his eyes to find that he was in a completely different location than the bar. Sitting up quickly and regretting every second of it, Tylant found that he was in a small space, like a shack or shed, a temporary structure. They were also in the city, lest the horde of spores would envelop them all due to the window being open. No wait, there was no window, just a rectangular shaped hole in the wall, with a really big gun aiming out of it. The human was there, aiming down the sight of this magnificent weapon, out of his casual wear and into a strange set of armor. The only part he recognized was the Aegis chest plate, the others were either models he couldn't identify or were to banged up to resemble armor anymore. He looked calm enough to talk to without getting shot. At least not shot somewhere vital.

"Head?"

His voice was the equivalent of metal on metal. Tylant covered his ears. Jakyll just looked at him funny, and handed him a M-8 Avenger. Tylant almost aimed it at him, but could see the rifle didn't have a thermal clip in it. Could probably only fire once before the lack of heat sinks melted the various components of the weapon. It was also probably the human had a kinetic barrier on.

"First you point one at me, now you give one?"

"Sure, here's the pistol I almost shot you with too, should give you some nostalgia."

Jakyll tossed, Tylant caught, and immediately aimed at the previous owner. This thing was still loaded.

"I want answers, and something for my headache." He demanded

"Soon enough, I was going to tell you, but since your here, I need your help and we don't have time to discuss the reasons for my actions.

"So you ask if I'm willing to help you after you knock me out and drag me to your secret lair?"

"Sounds about right, think I was supposed to ask before I knocked you out. I never was good at socializing." Jakyll moved off the scope of the weapon, and looked upon the young turian who so eagerly aimed the weapon at its previous owner.

Tylant noticed the canister full of water, the universal drink of the gods, and drank sparingly. His headache was replaced with a dull pain, and he decided to get up off the bed. No wait-floor, he was asleep on the floor, this guy can't get anything right. He never took the gun off of the human.

"What are you looking for?"

"A quarian."

He thought a moment, than decided to go ahead and ask why. Lowering the pistol at the thought of similar goals.

"Why?"

"Because the only way we're getting off this rock is if we work together, I need a ship, you need a ship, that quarian has a perfectly good ship in the works. Lets go get her, get it, and get out."

"Can't I at least go get some provisions from town before we do this? There's no way were gonna take the ship tonight, we can always hold-"

"Got to."

"-it" Tylant blinked, he didn't know the human was so influential in his decisions. "Why the urgency?"

"Town has at least seven more operatives from our favorite pro-human organization than it did last night in town, and those are the ones I noticed, there up to something, and I rather like living. They had a ship touch down disguised as a trading vessel. It was full to the brim with eggs in some sort of cryogenic storage. That was two weeks ago. There up to something, and I don't want to be around when things get bad."

"How do you know all of this?"

"Did some scouting. I let you read the story at the bar because there were operatives listening in. The opportunity to catch me should be too good to pass up. It should at least ground them until tomorrow."

Tylant gave it some thought, after a slight pause, "Is it that dangerous to go into town?"

"You have a bounty on your head. Or did you forget that part too?"

"What! Why?" There was too much focus on the life threatening weapon earlier today to catch all of what Jakyll had said.

"Believe Arterius has something to do with it."

"Dammit. Didn't think my father's name would get me into trouble."

"Please, your in the heart of a merc planet, setting foot in town would be like setting foot into your own morgue. "

Tylant gave him a stern look.

"That was a bad pun, I apologize."

"Can't go in town, can't leave without quarian, what does that leave us at?"

"I thought they taught you turians how to fight. Its obvious that blood will be shed before the day is done."

"In the middle of the night?"

"Hell no, we wait until morning, we'll catch em with their pants down and dirt in their eyes."

/

Deya woke to find day breaking, and the sky falling.

Nameless explosions rocked the complex in the heart of the city, the complex holding her to be precise. The guy was so egotistical he put his base of operations in the middle of the city. Shame that seems to be biting him in the ass. One large earthquake caused rubble to fall and people to shout. _Earthquake?_ The armory must've went up in flames, Deya passed it enough to know it lined the main support beam for this side of the complex.

She heard orders being yelled out from outside her door, and she naturally started eavesdropping. Her helmeted head near the door, but not looking outside the bars.

"We gotta get outside, right goddamn now!" It was a guard

"Door's jammed!" Another guard

*Bang* What was left of a guard.

"Shit! Kenny just blew up!" The second guard

"What? Why?" A third guard

That was Deya's own doing, she had gotten a moment to mess with some of the explosive carelessly lying about, she couldn't hide it on her person, but it certainly screwed up anyone who tried to detonate with a timer.

"Doesn't matter everyone out!"

"What about the quarian?"

"Leave her, Reeche can tear us a new asshole about leaving her behind after we get out of the building." Footsteps

_No no no no no! Don't leave me in the collapsing building with all the dead people and crazy explosions!_

As if by magic, her door toppled over, not opening, but the wall itself fell out from in front of her. She thought about it for half a second, and the other half was spent racing down the corridor in the opposite direction of the mercs.

After a dozen twists, a few turns, and a near-death experience involving a kitchen utensil that probably shouldn't have been protruding from the wall at that angle, she had managed to grab a machine pistol off a dead guard and find a door leading to an outside area, as in freedom! She could almost imagine herself almost imagining the smell of fresh air when a mercenary turned the corner started leveling his gun at her, probably thinking she caused this.

No sooner had she decided to sprint past the last two meters to him and the door, and in mid-stride, she heard the strangest sound in the world, like a drumbeat, only with more echo and sonic boom, and her visor suddenly became red, very red.

_So this is what its like to be dead. How come I'm still running then? _She was already outside, and saw through the haze of red that the guard's head had _exploded _as she ran past him. The red was not blood of her own, and it was _all over her_. Deya stated to feel queasy and tried to clean her visor quickly. She took in her surroundings whist doing this and noticed she was on the side of a road passing the compound. She hadn't stopped running for since she sprinted through the door.

After years of practice, she finally had the art of self-maintenance down and was now seeing the world clearly. Wasn't much better than the tinted version. People running a muck, piling into the ship she had 'repaired' and firing into an unseen angle. The loud roar she heard did nothing to quench her fears.

Through all the chaos, she noticed two figures on the roof of a two story building, one with a very large rifle, waving it in the air towards her. She then heard words she thought were reserved for childhood dreams.

" Deya'Torgue nar Koal, were here to save y-." The figure's perch broke out from under him in what might have been a structural weakness. She could hear the very loud curse in human tongue and saw

him hit the pavement directly onto his chest, she could only hope that his turian friend who currently had his hand on his face and turning to take the fire exit on the side of the building was helping her too.

**Backing up time a bit...**

Jakyll decided that the best way to infiltrate the base would be to don the uniform of the mercenaries that guarded it, his active camouflage had recently been buggy, recent rumors from the bars saying they saw a pair of detached legs running away from the docked trade ship did nothing to stifle this claim.

Once the two guards had been knocked out, he realized that their armor was very differentiating, _shit, could have just walked in._ He had disposed of the guards in the dumpster near Tylant's stakeout point.

_Wouldn't have worked, probably had individual Ids, are all these guys freelance?_

From here, all hell broke loose. First there was the earthquake, than the unsecured explosives in the base going off, or maybe it was that and the _thresher maws, plural_ sprouting up all over the city. He saw the local mercs piling into the old frigate that was to serve as his escape route._ Plan B, save quarian, steal Cerberus ship._ As he thought of how he was going to make it there with all these thresher maws tearing the city apart, he spotted a group of mercs stepping out from the building, a few running for it, and a few standing around wondering what the hell was going on. Eventually the few standing around abandoned the complex, save for one, who turned around and raised his rifle. Jakyll was pretty sure the quarian could take care of itself, until he saw this quarian was attempting to run past the merc, and was a she. Exactly who he was looking for. Thankfully, Jakyll was already holding his Widow, and looked down the scope, fired and witnessed the mercenary face explode in a very nasty red, all in one heartbeat. He didn't expect the quarian to keep going after the merc lost his face, but there she was, running as far as the sidewalk till she realized she was coated in red.

After a few more potshots at the retreating mercenaries, Jakyll stood on the edge of the building, Finally realizing that Tylant was shooting right beside him. He actually hit a merc, granted it was in the cod-piece. _Not fighting alone this time, gotta remember that. Can't let the kid die now. Gotta scold him on proper use of his weapon._

Jakyll started waving his arms, rifle in his right hand, and he shouted " Deya'Torgue nar Koal, were here to save y-."

The roof portion he was standing on gave out, all the way. Having his arms in the air did nothing to stop his fall as he landed on his chest, and felt his ribs hold, wish they didn't, pretty sure he felt them flex and bounce off some vital organs. _Oooohh that hurt, chest pain, blacking out. Shit. Up to Tylant now._

Tylant stood as Jakyll stood, and watched as he made a fool of himself, flaying his arms in the air, screaming like a lunatic. When the building gave out from him, Tylant was preoccupied holding the palm of his hand to his face, hoping no one was getting footage of this. He didn't expect Jakyll to fall, let alone not being able to catch himself. The ridiculous situation just got toned up a notch. Taking the initiative, Tylant took to the fire escape on the side of the building and quickly moved down them.

/

Deya didn't think that anyone would come for her, but from the state of those two, she may have been better off on her own. She thought of checking on the human who had fallen on the roof, but her intuition says to avoid everyone. A quick rumble and the large ass thresher maw breaking through the remnants of the complex made her intuition change its mind. Maybe she should stop listening to it.

Tylant watched as the quarian sprinted across the street, covered in blood from the waist line up save the visor. Once he reached Jakyll, he realized the man was out cold, _damn, he'll be heavy to carry. Do I even need to take him? _The thresher maw that had burst through the merc complex was looking at them, and it started to retreat into the ground. _Take now, decide later._

Tylant picked up the heavy human, putting the heavy rifle onto his back before hefting him onto his shoulder. The quarian was upon him now, asking question after question.

"Whats going on? Who are you? How is he? Who is he? Why is there an army of thresher maws attacking the town? Thats a big rifle. How are we escaping? Why did you come for me-"

Over the time she asked all of these, the turian had managed to get the human onto his shoulder, and was moving to the staircase. Stifling all the questions with a finger and moving towards the fire escape. He was way to worried about the giant worm to be annoyed.

"lets go." was all he uttered.

/

Jakyll woke to a familiar masked face, smiling a little as he saw the outline of his face as she seemed to be peering into his soul. Those masks reminded Jakyll of his father. Not a good time for a flashback. Then all his memories unflashed back to him and realized that this quarian was violating his personal space, by _a lot more than he would let a normal person. She can stop slapping me from unconsciousness anytime._

Jakyll shot up, fast, his eyes wild, calculating the situation. Deya backed up quickly, analyzing him. Tylant was already on top of the situation, looking for the thresher that had focused its attention to the group. Some rumble started below the trio, and the thresher zeroed its way through the building they had set up on.

_Oh shit_ Jakyll thought quickly, picking up the turian and throwing him over the alley that separated this building from the next. Directly away from the complex.

_Oh shi-_Tylant didn't have time to complete the thought as Jakyll picked him up and threw him from roof to roof. Across the alley that gaped between this building and the adjacent one.

_Whats going on?_ The quarian was so lost, but this first thought was her last as the turian had gotten a hold of her arm and was propelled along with him to the adjacent building.

Jakyll pulled out his Widow, and started circling the beast, so that he was had a straightforward path and a little extra edge from the fire escape that lead down to the street, in case he need to run 'when the crap hit the oscillator' as his N7 instructor used to say. Turns out that chest wound had taken a lot out of him, he barely got lined up with the fire escape before the worm had locked on to the other two. The beast had forgotten about him and was about to hack one of those caustic loogies towards the others. He lowered his rifle and fired into its side, and the beast howled in agony as the round passed through it, out the other side, perpendicular to the two he was protecting. The acid dripped from its mouth as it failed to build up momentum. The gunk eating up the rooftop. Now the maw was _pissed_. Apparently it didn't like being made into maw kebab, so the beast was already turning, staggering slightly as rounds impacted it from the other two, who continued to run away.

_ Crap, gonna be another snotball headed towards me in two seconds._ Jakyll holstered his rifle and turned around, at the same time starting to run, he made some airtime and jumped off the fire escape railing. He could hear the strange noise the creature emitted as the projectile was launched at him. Hitting the roof hard, he skirted against it on his stomach and was slowing to a halt. Extending his right arm and gripping against the surface to increase friction. He stopped and saw as the other two were stopped three buildings away and opened fire on the maw, who started going into the ground. Jakyll grinned, thinking he had gotten away with superficial damage, there was too much opportunity for the worm to waste energy on them. The next sound Jakyll heard was not pleasant, a strange sizzling coming from his right as skin down to his bone dissolved, showing off the gleaming synthetic bone weave he had augmented himself with.

Tylant stopped as he saw Jakyll jump over the roof and the toxic sludge arc through the air, very slowly. Maybe his firing the rifle behind his back with the quarian in tow had paid off. He watched the ball as it hit the roof beside Jakyll, but he couldn't tell if he was hit, the lip of the roof obscured his vision. Even being three blocks away did nothing to dampen the scream of shock that came from the man. He gripped his arm and started running, extremely fast, clutching his right arm with his left.

Deya never stopped firing her machine pistol at the maw, pausing only to eject a spent thermal clip. She saw the human jump over the alleyway, and saw out the corner of her visor as the blot almost hit him. The scream however, stopped her from aiming, and surprised her enough to glance back to his direction. _Keelah, look at his arm! No way he'll make it with the pain he's feeling._

_Thank god I can't feel this, I'm gonna need some extreme medical attention after this._ Jakyll took off running, holstering his weapon and taking off towards the other two. _Shit shit shit, gotta find that Cerberus ship fast. _

Jump after jump, the human vaulted over the building that were conveniently made the same height, never stopping to glance back at his arm, hoping the pain kept away. He was gonna feel this one in a bit, he could already feel the underside of his arm stinging with report from the edges of the wound. Once he was parallel to the other two, he took a quick right and joined up with the other three. Never breaking stride, only looking at them to say "Keep up!" as he swerved past them.

Tylant had gotten a glance at the arm and almost vomited right then and there. The acid had done its damage and then became a hardened substance, keeping the blood from flowing freely. Thresher Maws, natures little twist of cruelty. Least he didn't get hit in the leg, that would kill all of them right then and there, Jakyll was the only one who knew where the Cerberus ship was. They had discussed the plan of action over the course of the night before the take down, but the merc complex was overrun way before they had to resort to even crossing the street.

Deya was tired, she hadn't slowed down for anything and the repercussions were hitting her like so many throat punches. She didn't have time to think, she barley had time to register that the human had stopped five strides ago, and there didn't appear to be any more roof to run over.

Tylant could only watch in horror as the quarian ran right over the ledge of the building. Gravity went into effect immediately, and she almost disappeared from sight. The last thing he expected the quarian to do was shoot _up._

Jakyll was thinking of where the ship was located, at least across the street coming up. _Street? _Jakyll slowed down and stopped near the edge of the building. Glancing down, it was a good a drop, bout the same as the one that knocked him out when he hit concrete with his chest. No fire exit on this one, but he didn't plan on landing with his face. The quarian took the initiative, or was simply not thinking straight. Right off the building, almost an immediate drop, than she appeared to have hitched a piggyback ride on a thresher maw.

Vertigo is something any quarian can handle, but the sheer G-force followed by the slight vertigo was too much, she vomited in her helmet. She then proceeded to faint, caught on one of the many 'feelers' appearing at random on the maw. Jakyll thought quickly and pulled out his heavy pistol, shooting at the thresher to get its attention.

He shouted at Tylant "Aim at the base of the arm!"

Jakyll was right-handed, not taken that opportunity to try and master the art of being ambidextrous, he could see the training paying off now as he tried to shoot the beast in the eye opposite the quarian. None hit home, and he felt ashamed to call himself a marksmen.

Tylant started shooting at the base of the appendage, only nicking the quarian once, which was impressive on his shooting record, but could end up fatal for her part. The shot had nicked the corner of her visor, but he didn't have time to look at the extent of the damage. As the limb broke and fell, so did she, dropping off the worm as graceful as a bag of rocks. Without thinking, Tylant launched after her, and found out that the drop went over the edge of the building.

While Tylant was busy playing hero, Jakyll had been trying to extract the spent thermal clip with one hand, eventually grabbing it by the slide and making a vertical pump motion. The spent clip ejected, he flipped the gun back to his left hand, extended his arm to steady his aim, and shot the maw right in the giant worm equivalent of a cornea.

**Scene tidbit**

One of the mercenaries caught up in the uproar had a holo recorder, and caught the moment on tape. When the planet is to be taken by Alliance in the future year of 2194, the clearing of the Morgue would consist of an aerial assault, taking out the maws while in the safety in the sky. When the holo was eventually found in the severed skeletal arm of a corpse, the image would be carved into stone and put into the town's square, showing every detail intricately, from the turian jumping over the building, the quarian almost in his arms, to the shot to the eye just impacting the flesh. The piece was called 'Ghosts of the Morgue' A term that would had carried over to any survivor from the start of the incident.

**Back to the story!**

Tylant caught Deya in mid-air, and proceeded to turn over on his back to reduce the impact of the road. He hit, and slid, sparks scouring over the road but at least the pilot was safe. Normally turians didn't turn pail, but the mixture coating the interior of the visor could have been blood, he didn't know how quarian physiology worked. There blood could have been this pale mixture of strange lumps of... turian military rations? _Oh thank the spirits its vomit._ The mixture was oozing out of a small hole in the top left corner of her helmet._ I don't think theres any blood in this gunk, I don't think she was hit. _

Jakyll watched the worm retreat down the hole, blinding a side of it had pissed it off beyond measure, but pain came before fury, and the worm collapsed to its right side, crushing a merc that thought recording this was a good idea, once it hit the road, the worm dragged itself into the hole it came from, dragging the body under it into a multitude of... _stuff._ Jakyll didn't have time to observe the lurid scene, he jumped down from the building, happy to land on his feet.

"Lets go."

/

"On it, where too now?" He had hoisted the quarian over his shoulder, drawing his pistol and cursing himself for leaving his rifle on the roof.

The ship, its on the other side of the Blue Sun recruitment building. Jakyll pointed out the complex, the low building recently abandoned for obvious reasons. Screams filled the air that were not nearly as audible since the party of three was preoccupied with the previous maw.

The riot in front of the large vessel was the possibly the second worst thing that could happen today, the first being the small armada of worms destroying the colony. Setting up on a multilevel shuttle garage behind the ship, Jakyll was looking down the scope of his widow, starting to feel the pain seeping into his arm, the artificial bandage of hardened sludge was cracking and blood was seeping from multiple orifices. Glancing over to Tylant, he instructed him to keep the helmet crack pointed downward so the contents of the helmet would drain. She wouldn't be able to see anything and the exposure to the air would probably mean an allergic reaction. He really hoped this didn't kill her. It shouldn't, but he had seen plenty of good servicemen get killed from a minor suit puncture.

Tylant was observing the riot down below, at least fifty armed civilians and assorted mercenaries with guns attempting to get into the ship. The frigate was not boxy, but looked to be held together by some hexagonal shaped armor, giving the ship a strange abstract shape. a Blue Suns logo crudely grafted onto the sides.

Having actually infiltrated the ship a while back, Jakyll knew that the airtight hatch on the top of the freighter was a structural weak point, having poor security on the software side. Jakyll motioned for Tylant to follow, and they maneuvered down a level, giving the perfect elevation for a jump onto the ship.

"Alright, this is how this is going to go. Ill jump first, and you toss Deya over to me. I need you to get her to wake up while I address the crowd below."

"Ok, but whats the point of dealing with the crowd? Aggravating them doesn't seem like a good idea."

"Don't worry about that, ill get you inside, but you need to wake her up. She is the only one on this planet who can get us out of here before we're worm chow." Jakyll was looking at his arm the entire time, estimating the time he had left before blood loss would be an issue. At least his hand worked still, he didn't expect that. That means it could still be saved.

"You gonna be alright?" Tylant was looking at the arm with fearful disdain, not only because it looked bad, but because he had never seen such an injury. It had always been bullet wounds or perhaps an explosion shell shocking someone, but never limb removal. Not that the limb was off, he could see the barest glimpse of bone, surprisingly catching in the light. Must be those synthetics showing, least Jakyll isn't a liar. But dying with a clear conscious was not the goal here. Living was priority one.

The human backed from the railing, and took a handful of deep breaths. Once he felt his shot nerves were getting their bearings, he sprinted for the barrier and ran through the open spot Tylant broke out of.

The leap of faith was witnessed by the crowd, and it became noticeably quiet as the quarian followed a minute after a few shouted orders were exchanged between the man and an unseen person. The man caught the quarian, shouting a curse that was followed with him laying her down slowly and the cradling of his right limb.

Tylant got a running start and followed after the human, landing on a slope of the freighter leading to another flat surface. Regaining his balance Tylant moved up the short slope and watched as Jakyll went to work on the lock, and the crowd interrupted in hatred as they comprehended what they saw. These three unknowns were leaving in the last ship on this side of the planet. In twelve seconds, the human had the lock opened after rewiring some circuits.

"You have to get the second lock, take my omnitool, and for the all our sakes wake her ass up. She's the only one who can get us out of here."

Tylant had mounted the still-unconscious quarian over his shoulder as he maneuvered into the airlock, the omnitool secured onto his left wrist before taking the girl in. Jakyll heard the uproar from the crowd and decided to let them know what he was doing before they started shooting at them.

He drew his widow and fired it into the air near the edge of the ship facing the crowd. The report of his rifle made the uproar and frenzy pause to look at him, many pleading, many crying, even more frantic. Not to mention angry.

"I need for you people to listen!" All eyes on him

"I am going to open the loading bay ramp, and let you all in, when I do, do not make me regret it, I want all weapons you have put in a corner, there will be no hostilities on this ship. I will fly this ship to the Citadel, I don't care if your wanted in Citadel space, I don't care if your stuck with people you don't get along with. We will leave this place, under one goal, survival."

Tylant radioed in on his omnitool "Shes awake, and we have control, I'm in the cockpit now, we'll take off on your mark."

On his earpeice Jakyll responded, "Move to cargo, lower the lift, I am not leaving these people here."

"Understood." _I hope we have enough time to do this, we have been lucky so far, no maws have hit the crowd yet._

"This is not a time of heroes." Tylant found the cargo control and worked around until he found the lever to lower the ramp. He pulled

The ramp lowered, but they still watched him. Hanging on his every word.

"Enter now, and embrace a new future! An unshackled future! A future off this backwater planet, with your life in your hands!"

The people cheered, which he found amazing, that was his first speech, unprepared and under some of the arguably worst circumstances.

He almost smiled, but the pain radiating from his arm was interrupting his train of thought.

"Hurry up now, pile in!"

People moved into the freighter, quickly, but considerately so. Nobody questioned his authority, nobody shoved to move in front, nobody questioned his authority. That was a first.

Jakyll gazed into the distance, the Batarian frigate pulling into the sky at an alarming rate. Thresher maws surrounding the takeoff site. It was the strangest thing, the front end of the craft shifted, and broke off the engines and fuel supply. He watched the front end fall to earth through his scope, it impacting the ground with a very dull thud that was only heard but not felt. The screams of the worms filled the sky. He knew that those bastards would only have tried to save themselves, that kilometer long fall should have killed all of them. Not that he had time to investigate. There was a buzzing in his left ear.

"Everyone is on board, get inside before we take off with you on the ship." _Tylant, damn, I'm getting lost in thought. _Jakyll put himself into the airlock, and sealed the hatch. Noticing a lightheaded feeling, he started thinking of where to look for the med bay. His wound starting to hurt less. Not good.

"Sealing down outer hull now." He opened the second door, which closed automatically. Suddenly everything seemed to slow down as the floor suddenly got closer and darkness enclosed his eyes.

**A/N:** God this was long, hope you enjoyed it, im probably not very good at proofreading, so point out some errors and ill see what I can do about it. Reviews greatly appreciated, ideas and suggestions may be considered. Next update will probably be over the weekend.


	3. Chapter Two: Rock Bottom

**Chapter Two: Rock Bottom**

_ Look at me, some big time pilot, I get this thing off the ground it'll be a miracle._ Deya'Torgue nar Koal looked at the controls like they were in some sort of alien hieroglyphics and the lives of all the ships occupants rested on her trying to understand this gibberish. Of course, it was all true, but that only made the situation more desperate. She could only guess that the horde of thresher maws attacking the city were oblivious to the ships presence due to the use of built in docking gear. The hydraulics in the braces holding the ship up prevented any moment from inside the ship from being detected.

Her hands moved nimbly over the controls, three fingers deftly moving around ship reports, trying to get a sense of where the ignition would be. _No... No... That might be, wait thats the power readout. _Still glancing about, she noticed a red screen, contrasting to the usual golden hue. After extensive reading she finally knew why the vessel didn't leave while it had a chance. It didn't have any fuel, the helium-3 was the blood of any space faring vessel and should be be up kept at all costs. These idiots didn't know how to run a ship properly.

Deya almost called the turian that had helped her, but thought better of it. He was preoccupied with some other important task that probably required his full attention.

/

The _Irdnaught_, as she was called was an old, originally-turian-now-quarian defensive cruiser, doubling as one of the many ships that carried a population of civilians as per standard quarian living. She had served the flotilla proud, having taken out over twenty pirate frigates in her quarian service of fifty years. Unfortunately that was about to end, as she was on fire.

The problem with the _Irdnaught_ had initially been maintenance, the fuselages constantly leaked as the tanks and lines couldn't take the erosion caused by the fluids it contained. This required constant watch and literally miles of duct tape. This however, was not the cause, but merely an amplifier to a real issue that plagued the cruiser. It had no thrusters to maneuver in space. Instead of breaking the beast down, a young quarian on his pilgrimage had found the vessel, sealed the end of the ship that was sheared off, and proceeded to have it pulled along with the flotilla when a number of ships were dispatched to obtain this prize.

For the past fifty years, _Irdnaught_ was pulled by four small frigates as a sort of space howitzer. It was amazingly effective but could only be done with turian ships, the lightweight materials allowing for efficient tug and pull compared to the tonnage of other ships.

Maybe it was meant to stay this way, maybe the quarians got too ambitious, nobody knows. Having tired of dragging the ship around and wasting all those extra resources on starting and stopping. The main problem was not that the engines appeared to be working, but that the engines heat radiated into the ship, and spontaneously combusted a gas that should have been contained. Needless to say, the engines exploded for the second time in the ships lifespan.

The explosion ignited the fuel lines leading to the thrusters, acting as an ugly do-it-yourself propulsion system until the atmosphere fully vented. After this, those left alive quickly got off, as the ship was moving at near-light speed, making recovery extremely difficult. This all occured seventy five years after the quarians were forced off their home world.

The husk was never stopped, and the rumors kept not stopping with it. Some said the ship was alive, some said some ancient race decided to inhabit the ship and create a home of their own. Others just complain that their view screens keep getting blocked by a huge chunk of metal.

This husk was finally tagged by an Alliance frigate in the Ismar Frontier and its trajectory was matched to hit the planet Zorya in the Faia System. Instead of giving the report to a higher officer, a Cerberus spy picked up the data onto an OST and erased any known data on its location. The Illusive Man had received this data and it was the determining factor in placing the next test site for Project Undermine. He didn't even bother to tell the Blue Suns about the antique coming to hit their planet, those bastards made a habit of impeding operations. Paybacks a bitch.

/

Tylant watched as Jakyll was carried to the medical bay of the ship, the arm that was dissolved not so long ago had finally broken up the artificial scab that contained all the blood in his body. Instead of following the group of people carrying the human he found himself going off into the cargo deck where everyone was attempting to get comfortable. _Doctor, doctor, doctor doctor. Need a doctor. Anyone with medical experience could-might be able to remove the arm._ Tylant stopped that train of thought. _Not a good idea, he'd beat me to death with his stub when he woke up. I don't think anything short of a plasma cutter could get through those bones either._

Standing at the entrance, the turian started asking anyone he passed if they had medical experience. A few said no, some pointed fingers to others, and the search finally came up to an mercenary who had been a combat medic in the Alliance. She had long black hair tied up into a ponytail, and a face that could only be described as nimble. and was fiddling with an omnitool when he came over to her. Noticing the turian making a b-line towards her, she stopped what she was doing and turned towards the figure.

"People have been saying your a medic, we need someone with the associated knowledge in the ship's med bay."

"How many?"

"Most of the injured are just broken or cut, nothing life threatening. One man was hit in the arm pretty bad though, thresher acid ate away the upper half of his hand from the joint to the fingertips."

She considered this.

"If you haven't amputated now, your going to need an engineer and someone good with cybernetics. If we have enough spare omnitools lying around, we can create an artificial covering that will last until we get to a real med facility. The sensors in the tools will make holding the covering so much easier."

"Alright, can you head up now and see what you can do with a cybernetic expert?"

"No promises, but ill see what I can do."

The human took off, moving effortlessly around the inhabitants of the cargo deck. Tylant decided that the quarian was better off helping Jakyll, if they haven't taken off now, there was probably an issue with the freighter.

"Medical, you sure? Im an engineer not a miracle worker."

The turian wanted her to help the injured human. He was probably going to be hurt more than helped should she be anywhere near him for all he knew though.

"Not my decision, I found a medic who requested an engineer, I gotta find a cybernetic pro while im at it too. Like thats going to happen."

"Fine, ill see what I can do, but I need to speak to you after this." No way he'll take this well.

She moved out of the cockpit onto the lattice of hallways that squared around the giant rectangular cargo deck, taking the nearest set of stairs downward and moving along the port side until medical was in sight. She also noticed a human female moving towards the bay, on the opposite side of the hallway.

The human noticed her, more from the fact she had not had time to remove the blood from her suit than looking for the engineer the turian said he sent over. She only paused for a second to comprehend what she was looking at.

"You didn't already touch him did you?"

"What? No! I haven't even seen the human since I got on the ship."

A sigh of relief, followed by a stern gaze around the quarians face.

"Whats that all over your visor?"

"Whats what?"

"The pale gunk around the edges. You didn't puke _in_ your helmet did you?"

"Well... maybe a little bit."

The human chuckled a bit and gave her a needle filled with a clear liquid.

"For the breach in your visor, better safe than sorry."

She had used up all her antihistamines and antibiotics, on herself and the human, they had split them fifty-fifty on the way up the shuttle garage. Being captured for so long without being able to replenish her suits stores left her in a bad spot, but the human was missing half his arm. She examined the fluid with her omnitool and found it to be a very powerful cocktail of antibodies. She took it, knowing full well that she'd rather not risk dying from something as simple as an infection.

Before the day was done, Deya would have the equivalent of a powerful flu. She was already having trouble breathing through her nose after all the unfiltered air she was exposed too. To make matters worse, she had removed her visor in the then-sterile medical lab for cleaning while nobody was around, she removed the chunks and managed to get everything off her face but the nasty turian rations she was fed in captivity and un-fed on the run refused to stop adhering to her visor. For one of the first sensations she ever felt, it was the epitome of repulsiveness. Clearly smelling standard air was also poisoned by bile, only making the action she had performed all the more regrettable. When she got on the Citadel, she'd buy a new front to her visor, something that matched the deep blue thread lining her suit.

"Alright, you ready?" The female human was getting tired of the quarian loosing itself in its thoughts.

"Ive been waiting on you all day." the quarian replied with a smirk in her voice.

The two entered the med lab to a scene of chaos. Most of the people here were suffering from nasty lacerations and broken bones, but at the center of the action was the human who had helped Deya escape. He was being held down by a batarian and a krogan who had been working the medical deck. The human held the krogan by the collar of his armor using his left hand, and appeared to be head butting the poor creature, repeating the word 'Medi-Gel' with each smack upon the krogan's armored crest. Blood was coming from the man's forehead, suggesting he had been at this for quite some time.

Acting quickly the medic pulled out a very large and intimidating needle. The male human had noticed the door close and was now looking at said large and intimidating needle. Instead of taking a quiet and careful approach, she rushed him, and quickly stabbed the man in the thigh with the needle.

The needle met more resistance than was expected, this was because it went through the batarian's hand. The four eyed man seemed to turn a lighter shade as he looked at the needle with abhorrence. Once the mixture was injected, she quickly pulled the needle out and tossed it into a metal bin.

As one fell asleep, another cried in pain. It was going to be a long night.

/

The best Tylant could come up with when it came to cybernetics was the odd Sirta Foundation scientist, who was doing some rudimentary experiments on local fauna to try and decrease the rate at which the spores were produced. Something along the lines of genetic engineering induced by nano-machines. This information came from a shadow broker operative who seemed too shaken from the ordeal. No amount of information could predict a thresher attack. The Sirta scientist would have to do.

Tylant touched the man's shoulder and backed a step in surprise when the salarian jumped, everyone was jumpy but the ship was relatively safe. Maybe being habitually faster than every other species made salarians jumpy.

"Please don't do that! I have much work to do before I return to the Citadel."

"I'm sorry, your still concerned with your little project?" Tylant couldn't believe this guy, he was focusing on keeping his job when his life was at stake. "Like it or not your part of this crew. Now am I going to ask nicely one. Only once. If I can't get you to down to the med bay freely, I'm sure that we can leave _some _of you back here to finish your important work that could affect the very fabric of the known universe." His voice was filled with vehement sarcasm, and even the socially repressed salarian was not ignorant to this. A bitter retort would have followed had not the under layered threat cut it off before it started.

"Alright, if you insist, I suppose I can set aside my work to assist the locals with their menial tasks. I'm not exactly sure what you want a nano tech specialist for."

"Med lab now, we don't have time for specifics. Doctor-?"

"Doctor what?"

"This is the part where you say your name."

"You said yourself that we don't have time for formalities."

Tylant was starting to get a headache. "You know what, go, just go. Med lab. Now."

The doctor left after this, muttering something under his breath and heading for the stairwell nearest to the pile of crates by the starboard stairwell. Upon observation, the crate seemed to have some sort of communication array. Fiddling with it produced no results, it looked active, but didn't seem to broadcast on standard frequencies. _Forget it,_ Tylant decided the equipment would require some serious overhaul before it would be able to be picked up by any passing patrols, Citadel or otherwise. _Ive wasted enough time as is._ Proceeding to the group, Tylant started looking around for the third and final item on the retrieval list. Omnitools. And a lot of them.

/

Upon the arrival of the scientist, the two others quickly converged onto him and informed him of the plan. A few of the occupants in the bay appeared to be on their feet. The medic had been busy.

"Good, your here. I need you with the engineer while I prep the patient for the application of the cast. We need to have precision in the making of this thing or the artificial limb cover won't integrate with the organic components. Any questions?"

The salarian spoke up. "What am I here for?"

"I need you to work with the quarian to craft the cover. I outlined the damage onto this projection, you are in charge of micro measurements and how the cast will produce a symbiotic response to the body."

"If thats all, why have me here at all? Most quarians are more than capable of performing such fine craft with metal."

"Thats true, but we need to have the device tailored to the wound, this includes the movement of the flesh and muscle and an estimated size of the missing tissue and veins. Think of this as an art, your the imagination and she is your tool. Actually, don't get too creative."

The quarian seemed to glare at the human, possibly because it felt as though she was being forced into this, if not by what she owed the human.

"There was no bone damage?"

"A synthetic weave prevented damage to the bone. The weave had been present for awhile now, and its the only reason we haven't amputated now. We don't have the tools to cut through it without causing drastic bodily harm."

"Do we have the materials required to do this?"

"You do now." The door had opened soundlessly and the turian walked in, a noticeable load of omnitool projectors held in his grasp by his forearms. "I hope eighteen is enough, its all we could spare that shouldn't cause too many hostilities between us and the others."

"That was more than enough, lay them on that gurney." She pointed to the gurney sitting in a corner of the room, away from all the action. Various mechanical tools and measurement devices were lying on a small bed with wheels, as if they were going to perform some extreme robotic surgery. Chances are the tools would do more harm than good though, a rivet gun was as likely to cure brain damage comparative to causing it.

/

White ceiling, bright lights, and the putrid smell of disinfectant. A faint voice seemed to pierce the fog of Jakyll's mind. "Are you sure its ready?" A voice subdued by drugs replied, and the first voice spoke up again. "Good, standby I'm applying the cleaning solution." Suddenly the ceiling he was staring at snapped into focus, and his right arm simultaneously combusted. He lurched forward, his right arm immobile from the elbow down, he appeared to be strapped to an operating table, holding down his limbs but not his head. Some strange metal housing framed his right arm. It was the a scene comparable to a dream, the medic in his old Alliance unit was there, so was Tylant, that turian who was the son of Saren. The quarian Deya was there too, holding something resembling a metal glove, but cut in half from the fingertips down.

"Dammit he's aware, get the sedative, now!" The medic said, motioning towards a very large needle near a fourth party salarian Jakyll didn't recognize. He was quickly stabbed in his left arm. The desperately clear reality of pain seemed to be covered with a fog, and he slowly laid his head back. Darkness consumed his reality as he slipped into surgical slumber.

Once again, ceiling, eye stabbing brightness of the lights breaking through the fog, he felt a strange sensation from his right arm this time, not pain. It could almost be described as the a state of existence without feeling, like a machine. He slowly moved his head up and glanced at a situation as similar and strange as last time. A noticeable difference being the quarian perched over his arm. Holding an inactive blowtorch and looking him in the eyes. Without breaking his gaze, she ignited the torch, the deadly blue flame held uncomfortably close to his arm. He found himself slipping into unconsciousness, no drugs applied. The poor bastard fainted. It was probably for the best, since some of the artificial nerve clusters were going to feel the smoldering metal graft being applied to his old-new limb.

The quarian had never operated on a living person, and Jakyll coming awake really hit home how important this hunk of metal was in saving his life. Deya noticed her hands were shaking, the six fingers gripping the torch as if she were chocking it. _Calm down! Cooking his flesh won't help you._ The quarian tried to stop shaking, taking deep breathes, and cracking the joints in her fingers and neck. _I just hope I don't mess this up._ Her nervousness had accidentally ignited the torch and the human fainted. Maybe he wouldn't remember any of this when he woke up.

_/_

_ What the hell happened to the fuel? _Tylant was down in engineering, navigating the corridors and pipes with a calculated slowness, having already impacted his face four times on various pipes and ducts. There was a metallic dust in the air too, doing all it could to hinder his vision, the stuff stung when he breathed it in, but it should be benign, since there shouldn't be anything wrong down here. Well, except the lack of Helium-3. Having visited the cockpit and shoveled through the mess of reports to discover the problem preventing flight. He had also seen the large group of manuals the damage report hid behind. He would have to confront Deya about that. If she couldn't get them off-world they were all dead, but even the best pilot was useless to them until this rig could flying. The problem wasn't the storage, maybe the core was passively burning the stuff.

Reaching the main containment system, Tylant froze and held his breath. _This shouldn't be like this._ But there it was, the unshielded core of the drive core, shining dead in the turian's eyes. _Run back now! Theres no telling how long you've been breathing in this stuff._ He backpedaled, fell, flipped onto his stomach and moved forward whist he recovered from his fall. Tylant ran faster, he had been down in engineering for about forty five minutes, maybe he'd get lucky. He hit the emergency button on the airtight bulkhead leading to the core. He would have to run the air scrubbers in engineering and get someone in a hazard suit to fix it, but his train of thought of abruptly halted, as a U-bend that he had not noticed along the way down had suddenly presented itself via face punch. The turian had hit the deck hard, landing on the back of his head as the rest of his body continued to proceed forward.

Some nap time on the engine deck suddenly sounded very appealing as unconsciousness sneaked into the edges of his vision, the last object his brain could recognize being the flecks of element zero glistening in the low light.

/

"Blood loss not marginal, graft to the skin a success, symbiosis between the machine and the man achieved." The salarian doctor chimed in as the engineer passed through the med bay.

"Thats good, you think he'll make a full recovery?"

"There was no way he could be normal if he wanted to. If he got a permanent cover it still would create phantom pains and require a maintainer, just as the body requires a surgeon to repair heavy organic damage."

"Oh." All scars carry responsibility, it looked as though his would just have more weight to it par usual.

A noise emitted from the human, some sort of guttural acknowledgement of existance sounded from the man, and he made a motion for his normal hand towards the salarian doctor. A few blinks followed by a slow footfall as the doctor moved to the patients right side.

"Doctor?" The human was very quiet, almost unnoticeable.

"Yes?" A meek reply, sounding inexperienced and unsure of what to do.

*WHAM* the human decked the doctor with the remade arm, lifting the doctor off the floor, and a good three meters before he hit the ground and proceeded to slide, he was out cold and probably had a broken mouth.

The human was looking at his arm, grinning. "Still works." he flexed the arm experimentally, expressions of surprise and awe covering his face as he examined the metalwork. Two metal straps held the covering down to prevent the system from coming off due to physical stress or sudden bashings. There was a synthetic material binding the metal to the man, it was clearly visible at the joint in his wrist and his hand. The hand worked fine, all movements came naturally but the arm itself had an extra fifteen pounds of equipment where as the lost flesh and muscle had summed out to maybe six pounds of removed organic stuff. It was noticeable, slowing his movement and throwing almost triple the amount of mass to one side.

He was touching the sensors on his new hand with his organic arm, to find that he couldn't _feel_ the metal. It was strange, maybe this is what it was like to be a robot. His musing and experimentation was interrupted by the quarian who had been meekly standing in a corner.

"Its an artificial muscle, we hardwired it and a few external touch sensors to what was left of your original arm. To put it simply, your about seven percent geth. Just because you don't feel it doesn't mean its not being damaged, your actually going to have to pay attention to it because you have real blood flowing through it."

"Hunh." Certainly would take some getting used to. He moved his legs to the side of his bed and tried using them. Looks like his arms got up to speed quicker than his legs and Jakyll slipped right on his ass. At first he just sat there, staring intently at a random point in the med bay, then he started laughing. He couldn't stop, wouldn't stop for ten minutes, and a few of the occupants joined in too. The quarian helped Jakyll to his feet and slowed down his breath intake as his side was starting to cramp from the attempt to stifle the giggles. There was just not enough times to enjoy the little things.

/

Tylant woke to find he was still on the engine deck. Nobody had bothered to see where he was. That certainly made him feel appreciated. Remembering the free floating element zero, he sat up quickly and he, once again, impacted his cranium into a pipe. If it made any difference, this was a right angle bend that he didn't see on his way down.

/

In the process of hobbling down a set of stairs using the quarian as a cane, Jakyll found a group of five or more people moving toward him. Two krogan, a batarian, asari, and human made quick progress to the two at the base of the staircase. The asari must have been heading the group as she started communication.

"You the one who got us in the ship?" A soft voice that demanded attention.

"Yea." Swift reply, still trying to gauge what the group wanted.

"You got us this far and you still haven't taken off? If this is a rescue operation, your not doing a very good job."

Jakyll blinked, for all he knew, the ship was in the FTL stream by now, thats why the quarian was helping him, right?

"Ive been under for..." He looked at the quarian for an answer

She sneezed, then answered him"An hour."

"An hour?" Damn, that was quick. "I just got out of the medbay, and we are no better off where we were however many hours earlier?"

Now he was looking at the quarian, not trying to shift blame, but for all his knowing they should have been off this rock a long time ago. She was the pilot, it seemed unnecessarily dangerous to stay grounded with the army of Thresher Maws outside the ship just to take care of him.

The quarian started addressing the problems, her hands intertwining in a show of nervousness, "We don't have the necessary resources. We have no helium-3 to take off and the mass effect core is acting irregular. I sent the turian down there to take a look at the fuel lines."

"Well where is he now?" The asari stated.

"I told him to find me near the med bay when he was done running diagnostics. Hes been gone as long as you have been unconscious."

"How come hes not here now?" Jakyll cut in.

"I don't know, I was too busy working on your bandage to send someone down." Her voice quiet, as she knew that it had been suspicious for him not to report back. There was no time to send out someone to look for him, the doctor had been very fast in his instruction. If anything, it was a beautiful work for a forty five minute panic job.

"Dammit, go look for him. I have to assess the situation in the cargo hold." Anger in his voice, but also a hurriedness. Maybe he assumed the worst had already happened. "Take Sledge with you."

"OK." Deya started to walk away, but had to turn around and ask the question, "Who's Sledge?"

/

When one is unconscious, usually they don't remember much up until reality makes them open there eyes. This reality took the form of a human goddess, and she appears to have forced the air out of Tylant's lungs with her fist to wake him up.

"Whhrrraa." was his startled response. Followed by someone flipping him onto his stomach to allow him to breathe in the fresh air and out the element zero that seems to have lodged into his lungs. Good news is that the stuff was like dust when it wasn't condensed. Bad news; it has qualities of glass if you give it enough speed. The next ten minutes went by as a blur, a group of people careering him from the bare gray metal walls of engineering to the bright white lights of medical. The only constant memory he seemed to have was the warm sensation dripping from his nose and his face plates itching all over, like a minor allergic reaction.

/

The human medic and the quarian maneuvered to engineering, the medic wearing a full helmet in case the irregularity of the reactor created something in the air, like an eezo leak or some radioactive slop pouring out from its housing. The place was way too quiet compared to the engineering decks from Alliance vessels.

The quarian noticed something first, she froze as she turned the corner leading to a hallway connected to the core. It was the turian, unconscious from the look of the injury on his forehead. Only unconscious, thank god. What wasn't good was the small layer of eezo that appeared to cover everything. She found herself thankful for bringing her helmet as she rushed to the side of the turian.

Being a medic in modern day military was not nearly as hard as it used to be, either amputate or medi-gel, a simple concept. Then there were those things that couldn't just be bandaged or cut off, that being the eezo this guy probably breathed in. They had trained for situations like this. There was a simple process involved in clearing it, involving a lot of heavy breathing and a blood coagulant, which she just so happened to leave in the med bay. She couldn't carry the turian back with eezo in him, it could spread it throughout the ship, and no species appreciates radiation, except maybe krogan. She did the only thing that seemed applicable in the situation, she punched the turian in the gut right below the ribs, forcing the air from his chest. She quickly flipped him over as a stream of blood and element zero flew from his nose in a bright display of radioactive blue. It didn't stop there as he kept trying to breathe through his nose, it kept coming, she was going to need that coagulant fast.

"Grab his legs." The quarian had her back to the medic, messing with what might have been air filtration systems, a reasonable guess as the sound of fans filled the halls. She turned around and grabbed the turian's legs, one in each hand, and followed the medic as she made a u-turn and carried Tylant to the elevator.

/

"Alright next."

Jakyll was addressing the crowd of seventy five or so people that had grouped in front of him, the other twenty five had either already been answered or were preoccupied with an important task. A human raised his hand to get his attention to the injured man sitting on the crate. Jakyll motioned for him to go ahead.

"What are we going to do about food? The provisions on this ship are not enough to last an extended period of time if were forced to stay for long."

"Then we can search the nearby buildings for food, but we shouldn't be here longer than twenty four hours."

A batarian spoke up, "What about the Thresher Maws? If we go out, how are we going to deal with them?"

Instead of a straightforward answer, Jakyll jumped from his makeshift podium and moved towards a small set of briefcases clustered on top of an improvised table. He opened one up and displayed the contents, a pair of rocket launchers. Keeping the briefcase in the air, he kicked a switch on a container to his left. The door slid open, and a mountain of missiles fell from the entrance. At least The Illusive Man arms his troops well.

"Thats how. Next."

/

_ What is this, sabotage?_ Deya was fiddling with the core controls, trying to decipher what exactly was causing the shield around the core to fail. It was a power issue, but she can't find the outlet that gave the shield its juice. _It doesn't run on the main battery, else all local power would be out. It lacks a separate unit, or its very well hidden, which wouldn't make sense. That leaves the engine's Helium-3 and the solar panels used to recharge the main batteries, and theres no way in hell an eezo shield system could constantly be maintained by one alone. They could have been working in conjunction._ But the fuel lines were breached and the tank is empty. There could have been some left floating around in the air, maybe if the panels were working at full capacity it might be enough to keep the shield up to a minimal amount. _If thats the case, this thing could have gone critical hours ago. _She started to panic, knowing that the only thing keeping this ship operational was the sun the planet orbited. She looked at the clock in her HUD, it was 3:51. Maybe about thirty minutes until the light's intensity died down from the sun setting and the ship blew up. So much as a cloud could make the ship destroy itself.

/

Tylant woke to a face he had a faint remembrance of seeing before, deep black, possibly blue hair framing the face of a human female, he hadn't noticed her beauty before, but his train of thought was interrupted as she appeared to be stuffing fabric up his nose.

"Whut duh heall are youu doing?" He couldn't speak straight, it felt like someone had poured concrete into his sinuses.

"Saving your life, now hold still or your sinuses wont scab."

The voice was angelic, like the wind blowing over a field of grass. He was not totally enthralled though, and the alien mix of medical terms had confused him.

"Ie hett mye head thyat harrd?" He cringed at his own voice as the gunk in his nose amplified his head pain, and probably giving every normal-hearing being in the room a headache.

"Nope, you inhaled a large amount of element zero, and should be resting now, or else you might not heal properly. Don't try to breathe out your nose for some time. You could open the cuts lining your air passages and die."

"Ohh." He proceeded to lay stock still "Okay." Where the concrete was not, glass was. His whole head hurt.

"I take it you want to know what happened?" The human started.

Tylant lifted his thumb upwards, hoping he was saying yes and not asking for free transportation. Human terms are sometimes very hard to understand. Should have studied on it more. But judging by her reaction, he must be right.

"You ran into a pipe, unconsciousness was immediate judging by the state I found you in, since you hit your head a pipe... again. After dragging you here with the quarian, I gave you a coagulant so you didn't bleed out from your nose. Gotta tell ya, didn't think you'd make it. Being exposed to eezo radiation for two hours usually would turn you into a gelatinous blob. So far all its done is made your carapace grow out and change color."

Tylant blinked in rapid succession, really hoping this was a bad dream.

"I have a mirror if you want to see it..."

"No thank you. I am already suffering from a life-threatening nosebleed, I don't need more humiliation."

/

Jakyll had appeased the crowd to a degree, and was now looking for the quarian, turns out they had a small batch of compressed H-3 behind the two Makos in a corner of the storage bay. He had them moved towards the fuel intake. They might be able to take off quicker than they thought, depends on whats wrong with the core. Turns out Jakyll didn't need to look far to find Deya, who almost tackled him in a corner turn. To her credit, her stride didn't falter too much.

"Sorry! Gotta run, can't explain! We'll all die if I don't find fuel lines!" her voice was labored and stuffy.

As she took off, Jakyll got off the floor and took off after her. _Wait, what?_

"Whats wrong with the... fuel lines." He was having trouble keeping up, having not moved this quickly since he was under.

"Breach somewhere, gotta find it, core might go critical."

"Shit! I know where the breach is!"

The quarian stopped in her tracks, and actually stared at him for a full second before asking, "Where?"

/

Out of all the oddball groups of beings scattered through the ship, a peculiar group of five seemed to stand out the most, most importantly, the asari leading them. Perhaps what made them stand out was that they had volunteered to stand on the top of the ship and keep a look out for survivors. Initiative was probably the only thing keeping the ship alive right now. They had already been four other people arrive from the city and you could see the hell on their faces. The city was either burning or crumbling, sometimes both. The group was scattered in a rough circle around the corners of the craft, having a flare gun on each one in case they noticed a group fleeing. They had already used what comm units they had to try and connect to anyone still alive. They were there, still kicking up a shitstorm in the dying city.

There were about three concentrated groups out there, the first group was a Blue Suns patrol of thirty or so responding to a local militia distress call. They were stuck in the skeleton of a complex near the heart of the action, might not be the greatest group of people, but they were holding out surprisingly well. The second group was mainly comprised of civilians and mercenaries who had holed up near the top floor of ten-story building. They were virtually untouchable by Thresher Maws, but the building itself had taken serious structural damage. The man answering the radio call, someone called Garret, had said that the building wouldn't hold overnight, they would have to be evacuated manually. The last group was actually the 'local militia'. The group was entrenched in what was left of a ship, something had malfunctioned, critically. Their engines made orbit, but the rest had well, hit dirt. Apparently the ten that had survived the fall sent the distress call for the Blue Suns patrol, shame they didn't edit the coordinates on where to go, they could have made the pickup for both in one go. The man who answered said someone named Reeche had been critically wounded, and they didn't have anyone who knew how to deal with his injuries. Looks like they were priority one.

Shiala, the one in charge, was not happy with the assignment she had been given. Sure it seemed like a good idea to send an asari commando _now_, but that was before the city was besieged by indigenous creatures as tall as a three story building. _Guard the turian with your life, a 'simple job' Benezia says. I would have politely disagreed if I had known it would come to this. Where the hell is __this Tylant Arterius anyway? Ill ask around the ship before I jump to any conclusions, but I wouldn't be surprised if hes dead. _

_/_

A group of two appeared in her field of vision, each supporting the other. They didn't appear to be followed, but they were not looking over here either. Shiala pulled out the flare gun, and fired with an angle towards the two. It shot up quick, and proceeded to float down slowly with a red glare. The two stopped and stared at the flare, and Shiala started waving her arms up in the air. The two made quick progress to the edge of the ship, and looked up at the asari. Shiala radioed in to the ramp operator.

"Exen, got a pair coming up. Go ahead and lower the ramp."

He responded in a manner very un-turian like, "Get their asses in here, we got seismic activity on the north end of the ship!"

_ Shit!_ She couldn't feel it, but the other two picking up pace to the lowering cargo ramp was a dead giveaway. The fissure headed for them didn't help either. She dropped the flare gun and pulled out one of the missile launchers given by the human in charge with the injured arm. The maw popped up at least twenty meters directly in front of her. _Thats bad! Really bad!_

She fired the launcher directly into the Maw's, well, maw. Before it impacted the inside of its throat, it hit the large tongue, essentially eliminating said tongue and forcing the maw to back off. Or so she thought, instead of retreating, the Maw threw its body at the ship in an attempt to topple it. The sheer weight of the ship prevented it from moving too far, but it partially collapsed on the top of the ship, cracking one of the numerous solar panels covering the ship and smacking into the asari, sending her bouncing over from the front of the ship to the tail end, a topsy-turvy roller coaster of pain. Darkness started enveloping her vision and one of the mercenaries that she had recruited was helping her up and holding a hand to his ear, saying something about a fan. Everything after that was enveloped in blackness.

/

"Wheres the breach?" Deya had repeated herself until Jakyll explained where it was. They were moving slightly slower, if only for the two seemed to be having different trouble.

"Its starboard side, by the crew quarters. I was discovered during my recon of the ship. When they started shooting, someone hit the H-3 line and cooked himself. I don't see why it wasn't repaired."

"Alright, I got it from here." He stopped running and listened as she kept going down the corridor. "You might want to go check on the turian, I heard he isn't doing so well."

She didn't stop to turn around and look at the human, the survival of the ship was priority one, if anything had taught her that, it was her twenty one years on the flotilla. She had hotwired the core shield diagnostics to her visor and things were looking grim. The core would hold for maybe five minutes, so long as nothing covered up the solar panels. She was standing at the crew deck entrance and started searching for the breach along the pipes. She spotted the hole, and the ship seemed to shift a small amount. And she lost it. _What the hell was that?_She'll worry about it later, she spent a vital thirty seconds trying to find the breach again. Once found, she cut a piece of the wall off and welded it to the pipe side after she cut a small hole in the square, making the hole airtight to the best of her abilities.

_ Whew that was close! _She glanced at the timer, and realized that she hadn't put any fuel in the tank to be transferred by the fuel lines. She could have sworn she had at least three minutes, two minutes ago. Instead of trying to comprehend how the ship was supposed to go critical ten minutes ago, she ran for the Helium-3 that Jakyll had some of the mercenaries move towards the fuel port. _He could put it by the tank, but he couldn't put it in?_ She jumped down the stairwell, passing a batarian and human carrying each other to medical. No time to ask what happened, gotta keep moving, else they all die.

/

Tylant woke to find he was not lying down, but instead, being held over a sink, it became very apparent as to why when he started coughing up the most nasty mix of mucus and blood. He spent five minutes in this position, spitting up coagulated junk. He didn't know what he was more thankful for, the human holding him over the sink, or that the sink didn't have a mirror over it. He had a vague idea of what color he was, as the bare metal reflected a small hint of red where the scabs didn't cover. Once this spill was over, he took a deep breath through his nose and found he could breathe, if only minimally, a small drip of blood was felt down his face and he quickly wiped it away with his hand.

"Feeling better?" The angelic voice started, bringing his world back to vivid reality and he realized that he had bled all over his armor. He didn't know whether to be embarrassed at the predicament or amazed that all of said blood came from his nose.

"Hey, wake up. Your are alive right?"

"Yeah, I think." His voice was harsh on his own ears, his mandibles flaying to try and communicate properly.

"What did I miss?" Much as he could wait, he knew that there was work to be done.

"You were out for maybe twenty minutes, the coagulant really saved your life, and time."

"Alright, I suppose I'm back on my feet. Where do you need me?"

She was about to answer when she was interrupted by some chatter on her comm piece. "Exen, you think they need help topside?" The freighter suddenly shifted and a number of untranslatable human words followed loudly from the earpiece. "Shit, OK ill send what I can." She turned to the number of people loitering around the med bay and shouted "Anyone who isn't injured, go to the hatch near the cockpit, we have guns waiting and targets that need to go down!"

/

**A/N:** I AM SORRY for missing the update, multiple times, like an idiot. Not that my words actually help. Im going to see if I can't squeeze in some extra stuffs due to this. If anything, it was time spent well playing Halo Reach =D

I kept this chapter shorter or it wouldn't fit the idea of the chapter name.


End file.
